The Voice of America has one of the most popular Internet news websites in the world, and in the United States as well, based on website page turns and user reach.

The British Council announced at the start of February, that we have had to suspend our operations in Iran. A sad day for the British Council, and also for tens of thousands of Iranians who have engaged with our cultural and education programmes in recent years. So far so uncontroversial. However, let’s not forget the deeper loss – the loss to the people of the UK.

It doesn’t count as public diplomacy — not yet. But the way in which the Iranian authorities have permitted foreign media visits, especially coverage by major American media (e.g., NPR and the NYT) , not to mention official Iranian comments on bilateral relations, suggests a whiff of change toward caring what the Western world thinks.

NEW DELHI – While much of the world celebrates Valentines Day, February 14th will be celebrated in India as the 50th anniversary of Martin Luther King's 1959 visit. And it all ties to photographs of King, Gandhi and President Obama.

To celebrate the anniversary, ten programs are planned in India featuring King's son, Martin Luther King III, Representative John Lewis - a veteran of the civil rights movement, and musician Herbie Hancock. (The U.S. embassy's description is here).

In the battle of Internet websites to attract the most user traffic, the one site has emerged as the most popular in the entire world. At the other end of the spectrum, of course, is the inevitable loser, with the dubious honor of being ranked one millionth in website popularity. It could have been worse, as there are almost 110 million active websites, but only the top one-million are ranked in order of their daily traffic by Alexa.com.

HONG KONG-The media in this commerce-fueled city have been fascinated by the fallout from Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner's recent Senate testimony asserting that mainland China "manipulated" its currency. The South China Morning Post prominently ran a Reuters analysis today that argued that "manipulated" is too harsh a term, and that "managed" would be better; besides, the article argued, the U.S. itself could equally be accused of currency manipulation.

Students of public diplomacy and propaganda are quick to point out the difference between the two, but sometimes it’s not so easy. One man’s strategic government effort to communicate with foreign publics can be another man’s tendentious information blitz to smear the reputation of another country.

Vladimir Putin is obsessed with cinema’s potential to sway hearts and minds. Over the past several years, Russia’s paramount leader has been tightening the screws on his country’s film industry. What is most remarkable about Putin’s move is not his power grab per se, Radio Free Europe’s anxiety-laden reportage in late December notwithstanding.